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Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Fork Hassle Advance Report, Part 2

Fork Hassle Advance Report: Part 2

Part two of my meeting with M. Dodds, and his assessment of the bands that are playing at Louisville's Forecastle Festival during a magnificent and scary five or six hour meeting over libations. See here for part one.

Matrimony

MD: [Reading from the bio, in an incredulous voice] “’It’s
said that a great band is like a gang, or perhaps a family,’ I would like to
see the notation on that. Who exactly who says that? I have never said that
a great band is like a gang. Or perhaps a family. “

BM: “ I’m betting these guys are gonna be pop punk.. though
Matrimony’s not a pop punk band name”

MD: “Yeah. Or maybe so?”

[We begin playing one of their tracks]

MD: “Oh shit! There’s a banjo involved. All right, I think
I’m good, that’s enough…. I mean am I just insanely out of touch with things? I
don’t know what I’m doing, but I wouldn’t do that…”

BM: “Says the guy [whose song] was on Jersey Shore.”

Blue Sky Black Death

these guys are Blue Sky Black Death

BM: “Alright, I’m interested in this next band. Blue Sky
Black Death… could be a positive metal band”

MD: “Yeah, could be… something….”

BM: “You know what I think the worst band name is? They
played at Phoenix Hill, and they’re from the 90’s… Hed Pe? It’s spelled like
this [writes it down]”

MD: “I… don’t know what that means”

BM: “They played rap funk metal. They’re from the 90’s”

[A brief silence, then laughter]

MD: “Of course they do! I’ve gotta go use the latrine.”

[BM begins playing a Blue Sky Black Death track. MD returns]

MD: “Is that Hed Pe?

this is actually Hed Pe, so Dodds can see who they are.

BM: “No, that’s Blue Sky Black Death. It’s weird that on the
Forecastle site, on each band’s page they have the latest tweets about the band
that have been sent out. It’s right here under the Forecastle Radio”

MD: “That could be to the detriment of many of these bands.
[Reading a tweet about Blue Sky Black Death] ‘All I wanna do is chill and bump.
Glaciers all DAY!’…I don’t know what that means. “

BM: “I think ‘Glaciers’ is the name of their album.”

MD: “Oh, so it’s not a giant pile of cocaine.”

[More drinks are opened]

MD: “Is this still the same thing?”

BM: “Yeah, it’s Blue Sky Black Death, I put it on while you
were in the bathroom”

MD: “This would maybe not be too bad, but I don’t get people
who go to festivals to see this kind of music.”

BM: “I think if you did some ecstasy, maybe do some of this
with some glo-sticks…”

MD: “I think this all boils down to that I’m just kind of an
asshole who has fun by griping about things. I guess I’m just not the target
audience. It’s not that I don’t like this style of music, I do, I just…. I
guess I would say, if you’re really high, maybe go see these guys. And stand in
the sun”

Old Baby

MD: “I’m trying to pretend like I don’t know who these guys
are and just judge them based solely on their band photo. I think I would think
this is an all right band photo”

BM: “I like the band photo because it catches Neal in
mid-drink”

MD: “It’s always good to see someone in a band photo who’s
just not even participating in the photo. They’re just ‘Nah, I’m thirsty, I’m
gonna have a drink’”

BM: “Jonathan looks like he’s making a break for it.”

MD: “I like that the description here is just a description
of their album that [recently] came out. It’s always very nice to see people
not participating in ‘band bios.’ “

[Shortly after this, somehow via a discussion of Twitter
user names, the conversation takes a weird turn into 5-10 minutes about how
every state in the US and possibly the entire worldis pretty much just full of terrible people
and there’s really no place to move that doesn’t seem awful. This concludes
with MD saying “every place just sucks. You should just live your life until
you die and then you’ll just be dead and you won’t care anymore.”]

BM: “Alright, let’s move on”

MD: “Yeah, you might as well go see Ole’ Baby”

Leagues

MD: “ This band photo is… it’s ‘you look this way, you look
this way, and the guy in the hat will look at the camera.’ Oh, but it says
they’re infectious. We should probably hear a little moment of it here eh?”

BM: “Which one?”

MD: “Let’s hear ‘Haunted’”

BM: “ They have two ‘Mind Games’”

MD: “You think that’s like the John Lennon song?”

BM: “No way. That would cost them too much money? But then
again, maybe these guys are rich.”

MD:“This guy does
have a pretty nice hat”

[“Mind Games” begins to play]

MD: “…no sir.”

BM: “I can tell you what this sounds like to me. I’m a big
Billy Joel fan, but I did not like that one album he did with that ‘Walk The
River Of Life’ song.”

MD: “You mean ‘Rock The Cradle Of Love?’

BM: “Did I make up that name?”

MD: “I don’t know what you’re doing…”

Johnnyswim

MD: “I kind of like the name actually. If they sound like
Weird Al I’ll be totally into this band.”

BM: [reading the description] “’it’s a mix of Lauryn Hill
and John Mayer’…”

MD: “Goddamnit… but they are very attractive people?”

[we listen more or less silently to one track, then start
another]

MD: [sighing] “This is kind of weird right? Like a little
bit?”

BM: “Hahaha, you’re just reaching…”

MD: “I know, I’m trying just to not be a dick. This sounds
like ‘WB’ rock to me”